TGS

Nintendo Revolution controller…

Keynote speech by Nintendo President, Satoru Iwata. 50-minute video with a powerpoint presentation that moves with it. Mr. Iwata talks about Nintendo’s current strategy of making video games intuitive for non-gamers while still keeping veteran gamers interested. In the middle of the video, he reveals the Revolution controller and shows some really really corny “usage” videos.

My take on the whole thing: You can’t have your cake and still eat it. Despite the promise of a revolutionary controller, Nintendo doesn’t seem to be pimping the technical specs of Revolution. This means that it’s probably not very good. You know how people say that it’s not the graphics that matter, it’s the gameplay? Well, that’s just bullshit. You can’t just claim that gameplay is more important than graphics and get away with it. Games with great gameplay can still have great graphics and both factors are important. Making a game with great gameplay is something that can be perfected through experience and third-party support (Uh… Nintendo, did you forget this again?), but hardware limitation means that your graphics are just going to stay that way until the next product cycle.

The controller is nice and gimmicky, but I just want to say this: It’s easier to release a similar controller accessory for PS3 or 360 than it is to throw a faster CPU into the Revolution. Although such a device might appeal to the non-gamers, Nintendo is also going to lose the support of the hardcore ones. I suppose this means that Nintendo will gradually move to a completely different market comprising of kids and casual gamers… Wait I guess they already did.

And on to something else…
Katamari Damacy for PSP!

Boku no Watashi no Katamari Damacy (Tentative)

Surprisingly, despite the fact that Katamari Damacy needed two analog sticks on the PS2, the PSP version will not use the single analog stick at all except for camera control. Gameplay will be controlled through the D-pad and the four face buttons intead. People who got to try it out (bastards) claim that the new controller scheme takes a little while to get used to but works well.